I am a new owner and a long ways from making a miter slot, but I am thinking about. When I looked at the designs and the articles that I have read here and elsewhere, I wonder if there is a simple way of making a simpler miter slot.
Two things strike me as I look at the saw, and the other saws I have seen. Do these simplifications make sense?
1) Miter slots on other are almost always fixed - there is little need to move them along the fence rails - they may need to be removable, but they really don't need to slide. The only thing that is necessary is that the base that contains the miter slot be able to be reliably replaced every time I put it in - it doesn't need to be parallel to the blade, as long as I put it back in the same way every time.
2) People seem to want to cut the miter slot first, and then adjust the base of the miter slot - why not do it the other way? If I follow #1, and develop a method for placing the base in the same place every time, then why not use the rip fence (which has been carefully adjusted to be parallel to the blade) as a guide for the router?
This leads me to think of building a miter slot the following way:
1) Use a piece of MDF (or something else that is pretty stable). Slide the left edge of it against the right side of the center portion of the saw. There may need to be some T-nuts to hold it in place, but they are not needed to make sure it's parallel.
If the left edge of the MDF "base" isn't stable enough, route a little rabbit in the edge of the MDF, and screw/epoxy a piece of angle iron to the edge of the base - the point again being that the base doesn't have to the parallel to the blade - you just need to be able to put it in the same place every time.
2) Put the piece of MDF in place.
3) Adjust the table saw fence so that when a router is held against it, a router bit will be more or less in the center of the the MDF.
4) Run the router along the saw table fence to cut the miter slot. If the fence is parallel to the blade, then the miter slot will be parallel to the blade.
Is the weak point in this design:
1) It's very hard to get the base in the same position every time, even if it doesn't need to be parallel to the base?
2) I am too optimistic about the parllelism of the rip fence and the blade?
Just thinking,
Mike
Two things strike me as I look at the saw, and the other saws I have seen. Do these simplifications make sense?
1) Miter slots on other are almost always fixed - there is little need to move them along the fence rails - they may need to be removable, but they really don't need to slide. The only thing that is necessary is that the base that contains the miter slot be able to be reliably replaced every time I put it in - it doesn't need to be parallel to the blade, as long as I put it back in the same way every time.
2) People seem to want to cut the miter slot first, and then adjust the base of the miter slot - why not do it the other way? If I follow #1, and develop a method for placing the base in the same place every time, then why not use the rip fence (which has been carefully adjusted to be parallel to the blade) as a guide for the router?
This leads me to think of building a miter slot the following way:
1) Use a piece of MDF (or something else that is pretty stable). Slide the left edge of it against the right side of the center portion of the saw. There may need to be some T-nuts to hold it in place, but they are not needed to make sure it's parallel.
If the left edge of the MDF "base" isn't stable enough, route a little rabbit in the edge of the MDF, and screw/epoxy a piece of angle iron to the edge of the base - the point again being that the base doesn't have to the parallel to the blade - you just need to be able to put it in the same place every time.
2) Put the piece of MDF in place.
3) Adjust the table saw fence so that when a router is held against it, a router bit will be more or less in the center of the the MDF.
4) Run the router along the saw table fence to cut the miter slot. If the fence is parallel to the blade, then the miter slot will be parallel to the blade.
Is the weak point in this design:
1) It's very hard to get the base in the same position every time, even if it doesn't need to be parallel to the base?
2) I am too optimistic about the parllelism of the rip fence and the blade?
Just thinking,
Mike
Comment